Here is Dennis Shulman's story about living as a blind man in a sighted world.

It's a moving and honest account of his struggle to not only live with but transcend his disability.

And it's about how and why his disability is leading him to the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives in 2009.

As Dennis notes in his story, the list of individuals with disabilities in the U.S. Congress--both past and present--is tragically short. It's time we begin to lengthen this list and help individuals who--merely because of their disabilities--have historically been denied access to America's most hallowed chambers.

Of course, Dennis is also much more than a man with a disability. To learn more about him, check out Shulman for Congress.

Before I answer this question, I would like to first thank all the commentators for their interest in my disability and their questions about the obstacles I have faced.

I lost my vision gradually throughout my childhood so that, while I could still read large print when I was ten or eleven, I could not when I was thirteen. Using a cane became necessary in my junior year of high school.

By the time I went to college (Brandeis) and grad school (Harvard) I was totally blind.
I started at Brandeis in 1968. These were the pre-personal computer dark ages. For all people, the personal computer has radically changed their lives; for blind folks, this change is downright revolutionary.

I've heard it said that the ideal political candidate is the individual who neither wants nor needs to hold public office. Instead, the ideal candidate is the individual who serves simply because he or she feels a civic and moral responsibility to do so.

This individual is Dennis Shulman,
a Democrat running for New Jersey's fifth congressional district seat in the United States House of Representatives.

So, who exactly is this ideal candidate? As a longtime student in Dennis's classes and congregant at his services, I believe I'm in a unique position to answer this question.

Hezbollah and Hammas.  Most Americans know them only as two more terrorist organizations, generally appearing in our news when they are either on the sending end of rockets aimed at Israeli towns, or on the receiving end of Israeli artillery.  

There's also been some gasping in shock that both of these radical organizations have recently been big winners in democratic elections.  The tendency from this side of the Atlantic is to look on the Hammas victory in the Palestinian territories and Hezbollah's sizeable minority presence in the Lebanese government as revolting surprises (i.e. "we give these people democracy, and look what they do with it!").  

But there's more to the victories of both groups than throwing bombs, and there may be lessons applicable far outside the Middle East.